Oct. 10
(Bloomberg) -- The four-decade clash
between Turkey and Cyprus has moved
offshore, drawing
warships into an area where
some of the past decade’s biggest natural gas fields
were found.

Turkey sent frigates
and fighter jets to escort the
seismic ship Piri Reis when it set
off last month. Days earlier, the
Greek Cypriot government, which
Turkey doesn’t recognize, authorized
the start of drilling in the divided
island’s waters. Off nearby Israeli
and Egyptian coasts, companies
including BP Plc and Noble Energy
Inc. have found gas and are
investing billions of dollars.

“What we’re seeing
now is a redrawing
of the strategic terrain of the
eastern Mediterranean,”
said James Ker-Lindsay, a specialist
on Turkey and Cyprus at the London
School of Economics. Any
confrontations stemming from
drilling there “would pretty much
close Turkish hopes to become an EU
member.”

Gas finds further
south have added to expectations of
success off Cyprus, raising the stakes.

The U.S. Geological
survey estimates that the Levant
Basin, a
triangular slice of the
Mediterranean lying between Cyprus
and Israel, may hold 122 trillion
cubic feet. That’s more than the
86.2 trillion cubic feet held by
all EU countries combined,
according to the BP Statistical
Review of World Energy.

Biggest Discovery

Noble says its
Leviathan field off Israel is the
biggest deep-water gas discovery of
the past decade. The Houston-based
company saysLeviathan and
Tamar, another field it’s
exploiting with Israel’s Delek Group
Ltd., may
hold 25 trillion cubic feet, double
the U.K.’s proven reserves in 2009.

“It increases the
chances of finding something, given
that the findings on the sides
validate the geology,” said Lionel
Therond, head of oil and gas
research at SBG Securities, a unit
of Standard Bank Group Ltd., in
London. “That’s why Cyprus was keen
to license acreage and attract
interest from the industry.”

National Interest

Noble, which
expects to start gas
production in Israel next year,
won the first gas exploration
license issued by the Cyprus
government in 2008. Cyprus says it
may offer more licenses within a
year. Noble started drilling off
Cyprus Sept. 18, prompting the
launch of the Turkish expedition
five days later.

The southernmost
point where Turkey's Piri Reis is
exploring overlaps with
the area that Noble is drilling,
said Huseyin Avni Benli, head of the
marine science and technology
institute at Dokuz Eylul University
in western Turkey, which owns the
ship.

Dependence on
imported energy has helped push
Turkey’s current account deficit to
about 10 percent of gross domestic
product this year.

Turkey invaded
Cyprus in 1974 in response to a coup
by supporters of union with Greece.
It’s the only country to recognize a
Turkish Cypriot administration in
the island’s north, where it keeps
thousands of troops.

Talks Frozen

The diplomatic
standoff has hobbled Turkey’s bid to
join the EU, which buys about half
its exports. The bloc admitted
Cyprus in 2004 and has frozen
sections of Turkey’s entry talks
because Turkey won’t recognize the
Greek Cypriot government or allow
its ships to use Turkish ports. Cyprus takes over
the EU’s revolving presidency for
six months in January.

Erdogan called
Cypriot drilling a “provocation”
that could sabotage UN talks on
Cyprus. UN Secretary General
Ban Ki- moon has said he expects to
push those negotiations forward this
month by meeting Turkish and Greek
Cypriot leaders in New York.

The gas dispute
coincides with a shift in Turkey’s
foreign policy. Israel,
meantime, has deepened ties with
Greece, Turkey’s historical rival,
and the two countries have discussed
routes for exporting Israeli gas to
Europe.

Instead, Erdogan is
pursuing ties with Arab countries.
An alliance between Turkey and Egypt
would “form a force 150 million
people strong,” he told a cheering
crowd in Cairo on Sept. 13. “We are
virtually encircling the
Mediterranean.”

Blacklist Threat

The premier has
threatened to blacklist oil and gas
companies working with Cyprus. His
energy minister, Taner Yildiz, said
last week that Turkey may shift
resources from energy exploration
off its northern Black Sea coast to
the Mediterranean.

An energy find would
help ease pressure on President
Demetris Christofias, who is
struggling to avoid becoming the
latest European leader to seek a
bailout, while resisting opposition
pressure to quit.

Cypriot two-year and
10-year bonds are trading at about
15 percent and 10 percent
respectively, the highest in the EU
bar Greece and
Portugal. Cyprus' right to drill is
“inalienable and non- negotiable,”
government spokesman Stefanos
Stefanou said last week. Cyprus
bases its claim to territorial
waters on the UN Convention on the
Law of the Sea, concluded in 1982,
which Turkey hasn’t signed.

‘Just Words’

A gas find may
generate $5 billion, or one-quarter
of Cypriot gross domestic product,
based on the reported size of the
field, Credit Suisse Group AG said
in an Oct. 7 report. Production
probably wouldn’t begin before 2016,
it said.

“Turkey is in danger
of finishing on the wrong side of
this by being seen as the aggressive
side,” though ultimately Erdogan
will avoid confrontation because his
foreign policy is “very pragmatic,”
he said.

Still, such disputes always
carry the risk of escalation,
the LSE’s Ker-Lindsay said.

“People like to
think situations are manageable,” he
said. “They can have a nasty habit
of spiraling out of control".

The Bab
el-Mandeb Strait, at the southern end
of the Red Sea;
the Suez Canal
at the northern tip; and the Strait of Hormuz,
the only way in and out of the Persian
Gulf, are all
strategic arteries for global oil
supplies.

Iran has
repeatedly threatened it will close
the U-shaped Hormuz waterway, through
which one-fifth of the world's oil
supplies pass every day, if its
nuclear facilities are attacked.

Senior
officials in Tehran have warned that
"any act of aggression or adventure,"
including inspection of Iranian
vessels' cargoes mandated by the
United Nations, would trigger an
"appropriate response" and close the
strait to international shipping.

The Strait
of Hormuz is one of the most vital
shipping lanes in the world, carrying
oil and natural gas to east and west
and any shutdown would reverberate
throughout the global economy.

"Maritime chokepointsare among the
most sensitive locations where
geography, trade and politics meet,"
a July study by the Institute for
National Security Studies at
Tel Aviv University stated.

"These
points have become increasingly
volatile in recent years and
especially since the Arab uprisings
began" in January, it observed.

"Complications
include increased regional instability
and aggravation of existing threats,
pre-eminently piracy, terrorism and
the challenges posed by Iran."

Any closure
of the strait by Iran would mean
cutting off its own oil exports, its
economic lifeline. But opportunities
are opening elsewhere.

The Red Sea has
become a focus of maritime security
concerns, in part because of the
pirates plaguing the Gulf of Aden.

The
1,400-mile-long Red
Sea is a strategic link
between the Mediterranean in the north
and the Indian Ocean, where the Bab
el-Mandeb -- Arabic for "Gate of
Grief" after the navigational hazard
it posed ancient mariners -- runs into
the Gulf of Aden.

It's been a
trading route since 2,500 B.C., the
time of the ancient Egyptians who used
to maintain commercial links with what
is now Somalia, a failed state since
1991 that spawned the current piracy
scourge.

Some 3.3
million barrels of Persian Gulf oil
pass through the strait every day
heading for Suez.

In recent
months, the Israeli navy has transited
missile corvettes and German-built
submarines into the Red Sea from
the Mediterranean, while the Iranians
sent warships north to Syria, their
key Arab ally, via Suez.

It was
their first foray into the
Mediterranean since the reign of the
shah, which ended 32 years ago.

The
Israelis have also intercepted what
they identified as Iranian arms
shipments via the Red Sea to
Palestinian militants in the Gaza
Strip. Long-range airstrikes in 2010
reportedly took out three such
shipments heading through Sudan to
Egypt.

That
longtime U.S. ally was thrown into
turmoil in an 18-day pro-democracy
uprising that toppled President Hosni Mubarak in February.

In any
further upheaval, the Suez Canal, a
strategic maritime artery, would be
vulnerable.

That was
underlined in 2009 when a jihadist
cell linked to al-Qaida was broken up
while plotting to target ships in the
waterway and adjacent oil pipelines.

A year
later a group run by the
Iranian-backed Hezbollah of Lebanon
was smashed plotting to hit similar
targets.

Now the Sinai
Peninsula, which lies on the
canal's east bank, has become insecure
as Egypt "is experiencing
its greatest political challenge in
over half a century," the
Israeli INSS report said.

Al-Qaida,
eager to target Israel, has apparently
moved in and recruited disgruntled
Bedouin tribesmen who have attacked a
pipeline carrying Egyptian gas to
Israel and Jordan at least six times
since February.

"It's
possible the Suez Canal or the
Suez-Mediterranean oil pipeline could
become targets for future attacks,"
INSS said.

U.S.
intelligence fears the anarchy in
Yemen, which overlooks the Bab
el-Mandeb, and Somalia across the Gulf
of Aden could merge to threaten the
vital sea lanes there already menaced
by increasingly sophisticated pirates.

Hizbullah
Mulls Attacking Israeli Gas Interests

An
analyst close to Hizbullah says the
terror group will strike Israeli gas
interests if Israel doesn't stop
drilling in the Tamar field.

10/10/2011

Tamar Oil Field

EAPC Photo

A
Lebanese strategic
analyst close to Hizbullah warned
on Monday the terror group will
strike Israeli gas-exploration
interests if Tel Aviv continues
drilling in the Tamar and
Leviathan gas fields.

"Zionists'
plot to find control over
Lebanon's sea wealth has a high
potential for clashes between the
two sides and is likely to have
dire consequences," he stated.

"The
Lebanese Islamic resistance will
not tolerate any kind of
aggressions against the country's
sovereignty," he reiterated, and
added, "Hezbollah views the oil
resources in Lebanon's water as a
treasure for the Lebanese nation
and has declared its position in
this regard very transparently."

"Hezbollah
will cut the hands of anyone who
targets Lebanon's sovereignty,"
the analyst continued.

Israel
and Lebanon have never had
formally set borders, and instead
relied on the 1949 Armistice
lines, or "Green Line," as a de
jure border until 2000.

In
2000, when Israel withdrew from
the buffer zone it had created in
southern Lebanon, it redeployed
its forces along the "Blue Line,"
set by UN Security
Council in Resolution 425. Lebanon
declined to participate in the
talks that determined the Blue
Line.

Israel
submitted a mapdillineating its
sea boundary with Lebanon to
the United Nations in answer to a
similar submission by the
Hizbullah-dominated government of
Lebanese Prime Minister Najib
Mikati earlier this year.

Observers
at the time noted Israel's map
took into account the Exclusive
Economic Zones (EEZs) set by
Lebanon and Cyprus in 2007, which
have already been accepted by the
United Nations and United States,
as its likely future border.
Israel drew its boundary from the
Blue Line on the coast to Point 1,
the southernmost extension of
Lebanon's EEZ with Cyprus.

Lebanon,
however, drew its border 17
kilometers to the south of Point
1 so that they would cut into
the disputed D, E, and F blocks
of the Tamar and Leviathan
fields. While Beirut's
economic agreement with Cyprus did
allow for Point 1 to be adjusted
based on future negotiations with
Israel, no such negotiations have
been undertaken.

Last
month an Israeli consortium, in
conjunction with Houston-based
giant Noble Energy, began drilling
in the A, B, and C blocks to the
south of the Lebanese-claimed
zone.

Also
Monday, Beirut said it was
dispatching doplomats to Nicosia
to renegotiate its boundary with
Cyprus. Nicosia, however,
has been conducting closed-door
meetings with Jerusalem over the development
of gas fields in its own terriotry
since last month.

Tiny
Qatar’s Big Plans May Change
Mideast: Oct.4/2011

Oct.
4 (Bloomberg) -- Qatar, a country of
fewer than 2 million people set on a
peninsula smaller than Connecticut,
seems an unlikely candidate to
become a regional power. Yet with
little fanfare and less warning, tiny Qatar has
emerged as one of the Middle
East’s most influential states.

As the U.S. struggles
to understand and predict the new
contours of the region, it would be
wise to pursue even closer ties to
this regional maverick.

Even with its
demographic and geographic limits, Qatar has several
assets that turn out to be in
short supply elsewhere in the
Middle East and to be of strategic
value, given the tumult in the
region.

First,
it is home to al-Jazeera,
the Arabic-language news network
that has transformed how Arabs get
their news. Many give the
television channel more credit for
spurring on the Arab Spring than
Facebook or Twitter. By bringing the
revolutions into the homes of every
Arab, al-Jazeera drew regional
attention to early events in Tunisia
and helped boost the number of
Egyptians on the streets from the
thousands to the hundreds of
thousands. Al-Jazeera
gives Qatar “soft power” well
beyond its size.

Second, Qatar has
resources. Last month, the International
Monetary Fund released data
demonstrating that Qatar is the richest
country in the world. With
a per-capita income of more than
$88,000, Qatar’s citizens are better
off than those of Luxembourg and are
almost twice as rich as those of the
U.S. This wealth -- and the annual
growth rate of 16 percent that goes
with it -- is a reflection of
Qatar’s vast riches.

Qatar’s natural-gas
reserves of more than 900 trillion
cubic feet are the third-largest in
the world, and the country is
reaping the benefits of an ambitious
program to monetize those resources.
Estimates suggest earnings from its
liquefied natural-gas in 2011 will
increase by more than 50 percent
from last year.

Finally, Qatar has
comparatively uncomplicated
politics, a rarity in the Middle
East today. The country is run by
Sheikh Hamad bin Khalifa Al Thani,
an emir who, in his late 50s, is
decades younger than his
counterparts in the gulf. While
advised by a powerful prime minister
(who is also a cousin), the emir is
the ultimate authority in Qatar,
streamlining decision-making.
Partially on account of its small
size, wealth and security service,
Qatar has avoided the political
turmoil of some other Middle Eastern
states. Its government feels -- and
is -- comparatively secure.

While the domestic
politics of many other countries in
the Arab world are forcing the
attention of their leaders inward,
Qatar has marshaled its assets and
has embarked on an aggressive plan
to shape the region.

In recent years,
Qatar focused its energies on being
a neutral party facilitating
diplomatic compromises. It worked
diligently to help broker the accord
between Fatah and Hamas; it helped
resolve a Lebanese impasse over the
formation of the government in 2008;
it even gets credit from the
Sudanese for assisting in a
political understanding over Darfur.

Such behavior was
consistent with the obvious needs of
a small country in a dangerous and
difficult part of the world. Qatar
sought to establish relationships
with as many countries and parties
as possible, and endeavored to prove
its indispensability without ever
taking sides on the region’s many
sensitive matters.

But since the onset
of the Arab Spring, Qatar has
adopted a more aggressive and
potentially more risky foreign
policy. It no longer seems satisfied
with balancing its relationships
with the greater powers -- be they
the U.S., Iran or Saudi Arabia. Instead, it sees a
window to steer and shape events,
senses its comparative strengths,
and has embarked upon a series of
bold endeavors.

In Libya, Qatar was
the first Arab state to vocally
endorse military intervention
against Muammar Qaddafi, prodding
the Arab League to make the
statement that ultimately gave the
North Atlantic Treaty Organization
political cover for its support of
the revolutionaries. Going beyond
rhetoric, Qatar provided six mirage
jet planes to the fight -- offering
Arab credibility to the military
operation. In Syria, Qatar has lent
the weight of al-Jazeera to those
seeking to end the Assad regime.

Even the priorities
of its $100 billion sovereign-wealth
fund, the Qatar Investment
Authority, have changed. Formerly
focused on trophy investments such
as Harrods Department Store
Co.(london) or “passive” ones
intended primarily to collect
returns, Qatar is now turning to
strategic investments in companies
and countries with which it intends
to build cooperative ventures and
wield influence. For example,
electricity-hungry Qatar bought a
stake in Spain’s largest power
utility, Iberdrola SA, for more than
$2 billion earlier this year.

Qatar
seems committed to shaping the
political and economic outcomes
that will emerge from the regional
volatility it is helping create.
Already, it is actively aiding the
Libyan National Transitional Council
as it thinks through reforming that
country’s national oil company, and
there is talk of Qatar helping Libya
explore its gas reserves. A Qatari-Libyan
gas partnership would help Qatar
address one of its primary
strategic worries: the loss of
markets for its gas in Europe.

In Egypt, Qatar has
planted a flag with the announcement
it intends to invest $10 billion
there in the coming years. And in
Sudan, Qatar will play a role in
enforcing the new “Doha Document for
Peace in Darfur,” which was accepted
by Sudanese parties as the framework
for conflict resolution.

The key question for
the U.S. is what does a region with
a strong Qatari guiding hand look
like? What kind of Arab world is
Qatar seeking to achieve?

The
answers aren’t entirely evident.
One could make the case that a
more active Qatar, which is
already home to the U.S.
military’s Central Command, is
good for American interests.
Qatar -- with its large investments
in Western-style higher education, its relatively
pragmatic approach to Israel,
and its (still-too-modest) allowance
of women’s participation in
municipal elections -- might be a
moderating force in the region.

Yet one might make an
equally compelling case that Qatar
has little interest in political
liberalization in the Middle East
(given its own closed system and its
support for Saudi troops in Bahrain)
and that its activism is grounded in
a desire to supplant
global energy markets with
state-to-state bilateral deals.
After all, Qatar’s long-term
well-being rests on global gas
consumption and the nation’s
ability to capture highly
competitive markets. Although
Qatar has shown little interest in
Iran’s entreaties for the formation
of an OPEC-like gas cartel, a change
of heart in this direction could
harm America’s allies, if not
America itself, which is almost
self- sufficient in terms of natural
gas.

A year ago, such
questions would have been for
curious minds or academic interest.
Today, with
the Arab world in tumult and Qatar
in high gear, it is of high
strategic importance.

The
U.S. is, no doubt, trying to do
more than read the tea leaves --
or rather, the coffee grounds --
in the region. It needs to build
and strengthen new strategic
partnerships with regional actors,
especially those that have the
resources and imagination to shape
events beyond their borders. Qatar should be on or
near the top of its list.U.S.-Qatari
relations are cordial and positive.
But the warmth and strength of this
relationship has been limited by
Qatar’s need to balance its ties
with Iran, with which it shares an
enormous gas field.

In recent months, the
small emirate has moved away from a
foreign policy based on hedging,
toward a bolder and riskier
approach. This seems to butt up
against, or even challenge, some of
Iran’s most central interests.
Qatar’s encouragement of the
revolution against Bashar al-Assad
in Syria and its support of the
status quo in Bahrain are two cases
in point. This shift -- while
opening Qatar to a possible Iranian
backlash -- could provide the U.S.
with an opening to strengthen ties.

What can the U.S. do?
First, it might build on the meeting
between President Barack Obama and
the emir in April, and schedule more
high-visibility encounters between
U.S. and Qatari officials. This may
seem insignificant to Americans, but
such sessions hold great importance
for Qataris, who prize prestige and
recognition.

Second, the U.S.
should trade in its ambivalence
about Qatar’s regional diplomacy in
exchange for a warm embrace of it.
Qatar’s tendency to have
relationships with everyone --
friend and foe, including the
Taliban when it ruled Afghanistan --
has historically made the U.S.
uncomfortable. But in a transformed
region, Qatar’s Rolodex may allow it
to shape the region -- ideally with
the quiet support of America.

Third, the U.S.
should work with Qatar, and
possibly other Gulf states, to
craft economic support packages to
post- revolutionary states.
The U.S. might lend expertise and
organization in Egypt and Libya,
while Qatar foots more of the bill.

Finally, the U.S.
should cultivate greater links
between Qatar and American
businesses. Qatar plans $100 billion
in infrastructure projects in the
run-up to its hosting the 2022
soccer World Cup; many U.S.
companies could profit from these
ambitions. This is how the fabric of
closer bilateral ties is woven, and
the payoff goes well beyond
corporate profits.

Al Jazeera news
media to be used by the
AntiMessiah big time.

P.Charles
is way ahead with his contacts.-

Qatari royal aide
'deliberately deleted emails on
Prince Charles's Chelsea barracks
role' June 16, 2010
Witnesses in a bitter court battle
over an unsuccessful £3billion
scheme to redevelop Chelsea Barracks
lied under oath to cover up the involvement of
Prince Charles and the Emir of
Qatar, a court has been told.

The United States
wants to fall
back on Saudi Arabia
oil in case of dramatic rises @
the pump.

ASHGABAT, Turkmenistan
(AP) — The Central Asian nation of
Turkmenistan is sitting on top of
the second-largest natural
gas field in the world,
according to figures unveiled
Tuesday by an independent British
auditor.

It
could fuel the global race for
access to the country's resources.

Auditor
representative Jim
Gillett said in a
presentation in the Turkmen
capital, Ashgabat, that South
Yolotan holds up to 21.2
trillion cubic
meters of gas, putting it
only behind the South Pars field,
shared between Iran and Qatar.

They
are also in a very
Seismic Active Region. Of
the 10 Worst Earthquakes of the
World, they underwent no.9.

Number
9.) The Ashgabat Earthquake.

On
October 5, 1948, a 7.3, 100 Mega-ton
earthquake hit near Ashgabat,
Turkmenistan, which was the Soviet
Union back then. The earthquake
caused extreme damage to Ashgabat
and surrounding areas like Darrah
Gaz, Iran. Multiple sources say that
the death toll was around 10,000,
but later releases in 1988 estimate
the the death toll was above
110,000. Even later, in 2007, the
State News Agency of Turkmenistan
release a startling fact. The report
estimated that over 176,000 people
died during the earthquake.

Netanyahu
Announces Deal to Free Shalit October 11, 2011

Jerusalem:
Israel and Hamas have
reached a tentative agreement
on a proposal brokered by
Egypt to exchange Palestinian
prisoners for an Israeli
soldier held captive for more
than five years, both sides
said Tuesday. The Israeli
cabinet was meeting in
emergency session to discuss
it.